The Scientific Vision of Women

Famed philosopher, polymath, and mathematician Gabrielle Émilie Le Tonnelier de Breteuil, Marquise du Châtelet, produced numerous essays, books, and translations of texts relating to natural philosophy, or the philosophical study of physics. She participated in significant scientific debates in the 1730s and 1740s, and her contributions were recognized in the centuries that followed, including as a source of inspiration for Albert Einstein’s famed theory of relativity.

During her own lifetime, she earned acclaim from academicians for her Foundations of Physics, which she initially published as an anonymous “parent” to translate Leibnizian philosophical views and metaphysics for her ten-year-old son. Illustrated vignettes welcome the reader into each chapter and reflect Du Châtelet’s appeal to a young boy, elucidating the fundamentals of physics through representations of putti (winged infants) playing racquet sports and riding on a seesaw (see images above). 

Complementing the vignettes are fold-out plates of pragmatic illustrations visualizing key principles, ten figures to a page. The illustrations demonstrate a theory of constrained fall on inclined planes and immovable surfaces. Figure 47, for instance, shows two spheres labeled ‘P’ and ‘S’ attached to each other by a rope, dangling over a pulley and a right triangle. Du Châtelet’s text describes how ‘P’ and ‘S’ are held in balance on planes that are the same height but unequally inclined. Hatching is used to give a sense of the volume of the round weights, encouraging the viewer to imagine their gravitational pull. Together, the vignettes and pragmatic illustrations demonstrate both the principles of physics and their practical applications within Du Châtelet’s contemporary society.

Label by Dana Hogan